Saturday, September 16, 2017

It's
the first word of my very first novel. "Breathe..." In
this case, I was using the term literally. My heroine arrives in
Bangkok and is immediately assaulted with the foreign smell of the
place. I still remember my own debarkation, back in the eighties,
before jet ways. Clambering down the metal stairs onto the tarmac,
after midnight, I nearly swooned at the combination of diesel fuel,
moist earth, night-blooming jasmine, and fried garlic.

If
you write erotica, breathing is more than an autonomic process
responsible for oxygenating the blood. Arousal reveals itself in our
breathing. We pant, gasp, gulp air, hold it as we wait in
anticipation or delicious terror for the next touch, the next stroke
of the crop. I did a search for "breath" in the random
subset of my stories I happen to have on my disk in text format.
Here's a small sampling of what I found.

The
song changed to something more upbeat. She shook her hips, did the
same bumps and grinds as the other dancers, but the effect was
totally different. She was listening to some inner voice. Every now
and again her eyes would meet mine, and that luscious smile would
light her face. I found myself holding my breath, willing her to turn
again in my direction. ~
Butterfly

~~~

His
beard was softer than it looked, tickling her. For a moment he simply
held her, breathing in, inhaling her as if she were another drug.
Suddenly there was shocking wetness. His tongue circled her navel,
dipped inside. Her sex clenched in a sudden, delicious spasm. ~
Chemistry

~~~

All
at once I wanted him. I grabbed him and fastened my mouth on his,
grinding my pelvis against his hardness. He opened to me, held me
tight as if he was afraid I would evaporate. “Where can we go?” I
panted when we broke for breath. ~
Citadel of Women

~~~

Alan
relaxes in his chair, enjoying Beryl's confusion. He's been in the
film business long enough to recognize an act. Her flushed cheeks and
quickened breath speak more clearly than her deliberately chosen
words. She still wants me, he thinks with a hint of smugness, after
all this time. ~ Old Flame

~~~

I
bask in his gaze, proud and humble simultaneously. "You know
what happens when you tease me. I'm sure that you remember the other
night." Of course I do, and the memory leaves me wet and
breathless: the binding, the beating, the final delicious buggering.
My sex overflows. My thighs are slippery with my juices. I imagine he
can hear the liquid squelch as I walk. His arm is around my shoulder
now, guiding me along. ~
Wednesday Night at Rocky's Ace Hardware

~~~

"Much
better." She flicks a lock away from my breast, almost but not
quite touching me. "But I certainly don't want to hide those
adorable tits." Seating herself on the chaise, she beckons me
to her. My nipples are just at the level of her lips. She warms one
with her breath, and it tightens visibly. I want to scream, to beg
her to touch me. She's running this show, though. We both know that.
~ Velvet

I
could go on, but I'm sure that I've made my point. The way our
characters breathe tells our readers what they're feeling, as much as
their facial expressions or vocalizations, their wetness or hardness.
And in an erotic encounter, lovers use their breath as an extension
of their bodies.

Breathing
is more than just a tool for delineating emotion, though. Breath is
also a powerful metaphor for life itself. Some versions of Genesis
say that God animated the clay body of Adam by breathing upon it.
"I'll never give in, while there's breath in my body," our
dauntless heroes claim.

Breath
is also used to refer to the spark of creative passion. The word
"inspiration" derives from from the Latin inspiratus,
past participle of inspirare
"inspire, inflame, blow into," from in-"in"
+ spirare "to
breathe". The connection to the term "spirit" is
obvious. In fact the original meaning of inspiration was "under
the immediate influence of a God or god".

"Inflame".
How appropriate a term for a writer of erotica!

When
inspiration strikes - when the words are flowing unhindered, the
scenes in my imagination painting themselves effortlessly on the page
- I do indeed have the sense that I've been touched by something
divine. I feel it in my chest, a kind of buoyancy, as though I'd
filled my lungs with helium. My poor body seems too limited a vessel
to encompass the joy.

I
wrote a poem many years ago about inspiration, called "metapoem":

it comes as the wind comes
and you can't change it.
you can only be patient
and open
and humble.
in glimmers,
in floods,
it comes.
you have to be
reverent -
silent -
or else
go out and get drunk,
forget it
to find it.